Russia launched its most intense missile and drone attack against Ukraine in months, killing at least 18 people, after weeks of a relative lull in attacks.
Russia’s strategic air campaign against Ukraine has grown massively in scale since September 2022, with salvos going from a few dozen missiles and drones to regular waves of nearly a thousand drones and missiles, after heavy investment into the production of the weapons. The first half of April saw a rare lull in the scale of strikes as Spring returned, capped by a brief, complete halt in honor of Orthodox Easter. This lull was broken on Wednesday into Thursday, with Moscow launching 659 attack drones, 19 ballistic missiles, and 25 cruise missiles, according to the Ukrainian air force.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha decried the attack in a post on X as a “massive terrorist attack,” and claimed it “primarily targeted civilians.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky raged against Russia over the attack on social media and demanded more pressure on Moscow from Kyiv’s allies. He thanked Germany, Norway, and Italy for new agreements promising more support for Ukraine’s battered air defenses, and traveled to the Netherlands to request further support.
Zelensky noted that “636 drones and some of the missiles were shot down. Unfortunately, not all,” an admission that dozens of drones and missiles hit their targets.
Russia and Ukraine are known to exaggerate their interception statistics, but even Kyiv’s admissions show a major decrease in drone and missile interceptions. Ukrainian officials have admitted that Kyiv’s advanced interceptor missile stockpiles are running low, a situation made worse by increased demands over the war with Iran.
The most recent strike was smaller than Russia’s record of roughly 982 drones and missiles launched on the night of March 23-24, but still large even by recent standards.
Much of Russia’s strategic air campaign has focused on scaling up the production of cheap and effective Geran drones, but Vadym Skibitskyi, the deputy head of Ukraine’s defense intelligence directorate, noted to the Financial Times that Moscow has recently begun stepping up the production of ballistic missiles — advanced, high-speed munitions that are much more difficult to intercept.
Skibitskyi said that Russia now produces about 60 Iskander missiles per month, and has increased the scale of its missile attacks in recent months.
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The scaled-up drone and missile attack following the Easter ceasefire is a likely effort to begin Moscow’s spring offensive, which is believed to be concentrated on taking the Donbas in eastern Ukraine. Skibitskyi said Russian commanders are aiming to take the whole region by September.
The rapid pace of drone development by Russia and Ukraine has transformed the nature of warfare in the country, with neither side having made notable territorial gains in recent months. The expansion of the kill zone, the area around the front line where the extensive presence of drones makes the survival of armored vehicles unlikely, means most battles are now carried out by drone swarms and small squads of a few soldiers.